Our local hospital holds regular drills to assess their respond to disasters. Because they are currently constructing a new wing, they decided to simulate a construction collapse. Being on fairly good terms with the local fire department, I was invited to join in as an observer, shoulder camera and all.

I arrived a few minutes early, set up, and got some very cool shots of the rescue crews arriving, full lights and siren. Then it's off to the "collapse." They'd hired a production company to stage the event, so the actors were in full makeup, the smoke machine was running, and they'd actually set it up so a standing wall had to be demolished to gain access.

Because it's on a fourth floor, and the only access is through a stairwell, I'm not sure how much access I'll get. As I go in the stairwell, all I'm told is to watch out for flying debris. So, it's up the stairs and through the wall we go. Then it's time to search for victims in the smoke filled room. Once the victims are found, they're brought out and prepared for transport down the stairwell, all with me right on top of the action.

Now I know this was a drill, but everyone involved treated it as real, and I can promise you, the adrenaline rush we had going was absolutely real. It took everything I could muster to get all of the shots I wanted, including the "victims" being dragged directly underneath me as I'm pinned against the wall by the basket...fortunately, I saw it coming, so I had my camera held out in front of me, pointing straight down. The makeup was VERY convincing, so this made for some incredible shooting.

Then we get them outside, where triage begins. I shoot that for a minute or two, then move to the emergency room entrance, to get set up to follow the "patients" on through treatment. That's where I hit the roadblock.

As I'm walking to the Emergency entrance, I see their fake TV camera guy being hustled away by security...."boy," I think, "they're playing this up right." Then the security guy comes for me, accompanied by a make ER nurse. They tell me that a "media area" has been set up to brief us on the patients conditions, and that I need to move away.

I try several times to explain that I'm NOT playing a part in the simulation, that this is real work for me, and I've got to get shots of the ER work to complete the story. All of this falls on deaf ears. The security genius keeps talking about how we're "not allowed to film the patients" even though I repeatedly pointed out they were not real patients and that I'd already taped them being rescued.

Even the hospitals PR guy seems totally unprepared for anyone wanting to cover this as a 'real story," refusing to get me inside. Finally one of the still photog's points out that he's on deadline (aren't we all?) and that if he doesn't get in to get one shot NOW, the story won't make the cut. So the hospital guy takes him on in...I look up, and here goes fake media guy right behind him.

At this point, I've still got the adrenaline rush going, and I'm seeing an amazing visual story go down the tube, so I start to get mad. I pointedly told security guy that he needed to go stop fake media guy, cause "if he goes in, so do I." Security guy says that's not an entrance he's supposed to be watching (thanks for the tip, buddy). Well, time to show them how the real media works....

So, in I go. Managed to talk my way past the receptionist and into the ER when fake media guy is dragged past me by security. I stopped the hospital PR guy, and explained to him in no uncertain terms that the story I had now basically left the victims dying in his parking lot, since I had absolutely NO video of them being treated.

Once he thought about how that would look on air, he figured out the bad PR they were setting themselves up for, and found a way for me to get what I needed.

All in all, it was a good exercise for all of us...and, yes, I did square things with the PR guy, he's actually pretty cool, and does understand that I would never barge into an ER under normal circumstances. And no, the ER wasn't busy at all that day, nothing else going on, so nothing I did disrupted anything.

By Jim Dean